Wimbledon & U.S. Open Finalist Captures China Open Championship
World number four, Amanda Anisimova, soothed her recent U.S. Open Final loss by defeating the rising Czech contender, Linda Nosková, to conclude the 2025 China Open. This win not only marks an excellent end to the tournament and a strong performance for the Americans. She took out Italian Jasmine Paolini and the tournament’s previous year’s victor, American two-time Grand Slam Champion, Coco Gauff. Today’s win against Nosková brings Anisimova to her fourth WTA Tour title, and her second WTA 1,000 title overall, also her second 1,000 title for the year. She raised the Qatar Open title in February. Truly, this match could have gone either one’s way, but here’s why I believe Anisimova found it within herself to win.
Strengths, Similarities, and Differences
Both athletes are incredibly in tune with themselves; in fact, they do not hesitate to pull their punches. They are both fierce baseline warriors, extremely sharp strikers who utilize all the furthest angles of the court to destabilize the other. They both have big serves and impressive defensive games. Neither of them is uncomfortable with approaching the net and dealing with volleys or other short balls accordingly. The two athletes each had 10 net points; Anisimova won nine of hers, and Nosková won eight. Nosková is quite strong, but of course, nobody currently on tour so far has yet to match Anisimova’s massive power, a huge decider in the outcome between the two.
Again, the two do not play conservatively, but Anisimova was the one with more unforced errors. She ended the match with 36 winners, which is an impressive number, saddled with the fact that she also had 35 unforced errors. The Czech player, on the other hand, managed 15 winners and 22 double faults. For a lengthy three-set match, it was hard for the two to break away for a while to find a clear winner, being so evenly matched in some aspects, but as time waned on, Anisimova found a final stability in the third set with definitive serves, blistering winners, and capitalizing on Nosková’s exhaustion.
How Anisimova Came Out on Top
The world number four has had a long time on tour in her career so far, and this year, she has been honing her fitness and body to the unforgiving and gruelling schedule of a pro tennis player. More time than Nosková. Though the Czech player did amazingly to bounce back from a 6-0 first set loss to win the second set 6-2, the toll of her long tournament was clear in the third set. Battling against Anisimova at that level left her drawn, and the groundstrokes that were cracking perfectly on the line as winners, and the deep rally shots that kept Anisimova within the baseline and from attacking easily, all began to lose their pepper and drop shorter into the American’s attackable court. The shots that still had any spirit missed more and more. Simple service returns and starting point balls were all long, from Nosková. The American, on the other hand, still had plenty of gas in the tank, and her ever-incredible ability to blast a shot for an unreturnable winner even when she’s already striking the ball quite solidly.
Anisimova ate off all of this happily, of course, and there was nothing more Nosková could do but wait for the championship to end. The frequency and speed at which the senior player was making points versus losing them meant that she ran away with the set and the match comfortably. 6-0, 2-6, 6-2. Outlasting and outplaying the up-and-coming Nosková, who truly did nothing wrong save for being unable to keep up with a top-five player, Amanda Anisimova made her mark as one of the China Open champions and has also now run ahead in her head-to-head with her opponent, up to two leading one.
